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I want you to take minute and analyze your posture. It doesn’t matter whether you are seated or standing. How are you seated, are you leaning forward or is your back straight? We talk about our minds a lot and how it afects our bodies but do our bodies have any effect on our minds?

Last week, I was seated at my desk ready to write this post. But for some reason I couldn’t get any content. I had writers block, and in addition, I felt very sleepy. I tried a few things to psyche me up like taking sweets, drinking water, stretching and even taking a nap but after all this, when I came back to my desk, I still felt sleepy. I had no idea what I was doing wrong until I looked at how I was seated.

I had never really thought about posture that much since it’s something that automatically forms. How we seat at work, at home, at school or even on a bench in town overtime tends to take a particular default form. You can think of it as an automatic thing that happens and sometimes because of work or too much thought, we may forget to pay attention to it all together.

I thought about an interview where I was seated outside of the boss’s office getting ready. When the interview takes too long, in most cases people tend to get a little comfortable. That means leaning back on the chair or slouching. The impact of this is that over time we become sluggish and by the time we are going in for the interview, we are not at our best.

This explains why we can wake up feeling like we own the world then a few hours later we feel like we have no control over it. We feel sloppy and tired yet the day has just begun. Our posture affects our present moment so if you want more control over it, make some adjustments. The idea is very simple, if you take a bus or matatu, ensure you pay attention to how you are seated because it may affect you after you get off at your next stop and if you drive, adjust your seat. This will help you reduce fatigue which is caused by bad posture.

As I write down this article, I am seated upright and I feel like I own the world. I can feel the ideas flowing through me and I feel more confident and in charge of the moment. So do you ever notice a change in mood suddenly especially when you had planned to own your day? Then look no further, your posture could be the problem. Make an adjustment, and take control of your day.

Out of the box thinking is a relatively familiar term to many.It is used to motivate and encourage people to be more creative in their problem solving . But what exactly is it and how does one become an out of the box thinker? In this article I address these questions but first, let me give you a general idea with a story.

Some years back, Motorola Razr was considered a top of the line phone. This was because of how thin it was. If people continued with that type of thinking, our phones would now be as thin as a sheet of paper but we would only be using them to make calls. Then Steve jobs got a different vision of how a cell phone could be. He thought of combining the phone and the computer into one device and developed the iPhone.

The iPhone may not be the first Smartphone but it was the first Smartphone adopted by popular culture. This allowed android phones to take off and it also allowed tablets to be incorporated into popular culture. So while most people were thinking of making smaller and thinner phones, Apple was thinking of how phones could revolutionize the way we live, this is what thinking out of the box can achieve.

So with that in mind, how can we define thinking out of the box? We can think of it as thinking BEYOND the confines of the norm. It means taking an extra step and looking at an issue from a very different perspective than we’re used to. The concept of thinking outside the box is simple but not easy.

Seeing how much we can achieve with this type of thinking, can we get better at it? Of course we can. Below are some things you can do to help you think outside the box and be better equipped the next time you need an out of the box idea.

Study another industry

If thinking out of the box is going beyond the norm, then another industry may be a great place to start. If you are in accounts, try and understand marketing or design. The idea here is for you to learn how people solve problems in another industry other than your own and try to incorporate the same ideas in your industry.

Take a class

The class could be on anything, but it should be different from what you’re used to. If you are into design, go into poetry, if you are a writer, go into design. Learning a new subject, especially one you wouldn’t have considered, is a great way to open your mind.

Read a novel in an unfamiliar genre

This means that if you like romance novels, try thrillers, or mystery. If you are into the literature, try romance. The basic idea here is read a novel that is of a different genre and setting than you are used to. Study how the writer expresses their ideas, observe the flow of the story and try to understand how the author get you hooked to their story. Understanding the different types of writings by different authors opens up your mind to more possibilities in other fields as well.

True innovation happens when you stop thinking within the confines of the norm. It may not be easy but the end result is usually worth it. I hope this article gave you a better idea of what out of the box thinking is about and some ideas of how to get better at it in the future. I’ll finish with a quote by Tim Ferriss that says “it isn’t enough to think outside the box. Thinking is passive. Get used to acting outside the box.”